American Jewish Year Book

AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK A Record of Events iind Trends in American and World Jewish Life 1979 AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE AND JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA The 1979 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK, the seventy-ninth in the series, continues to offer a unique chronicle of developments in areas of concern to Jews throughout the world. The present volume features Professor Charles Liebman s "Leadership and Decision-making in a Jewish Federation." This in- depth study of the New York Fed- eration of Jewish Philanthropies provides important insights into the changing outlook of American Jews, and the impact this is having on Jewish communal priorities. Another feature is Professor Leon Shapiro's "Soviet Jewry Since the Death of Stalin," an authoritative overview of Jewish life in the So- viet Union during the past twenty- five years. Particularly noteworthy is Professor Shapiro's emphasis on religious life and cultural endeavors. The review of developments in the United States includes Milton Ellerin's "Intergroup Relations"; George Gruen's "The United States, Israel and the Middle East"; and Geraldine Rosenfield's "The Jewish Community Responds to (Continued on back flap) $15. American Jewish Year Book American Jewish Year Book 1 VOLUME 79 Prepared by THE AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE Editors MORRIS FINE MILTON HIMMELFARB Associate Editor DAVID SINGER THE AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE NEW YORK THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA PHILADELPHIA COPYRIGHT, 1978 BY THE AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE AND THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher: except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a magazine or newspaper. ISBN 0-8276-0113-1 Library of Congress Catalogue Number: 99-4040 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY THE HADDON CRAFTSMEN, INC., SCRANTON, PA. Preface A he present volume features Professor Charles Liebman's "Leadership and Decison-making in a Jewish Federation." This in-depth study of the New York Federation of Jewish Philanthropies provides important insights into the changing outlook of American Jews, and the impact this is having on Jewish communal priorities. Another feature is Professor Leon Shapiro's "Soviet Jewry Since the Death of Stalin," an authoritative overview of Jewish life in the Soviet Union during the past 25 years. Particularly noteworthy is Professor Shapiro's emphasis on religious life and cultural endeavors. The review of developments in the United States includes Milton Ellerin's "Inter- group Relations"; George Gruen's "The Ui ted States, Israel, and the Middle East"; and Geraldine Rosenfield's "The Jewish Community Responds to Issues of the Day." Alvin Chenkin and Maynard Miran provide revised U.S. Jewish population estimates. Jewish life around the world is reported on in a series of articles dealing with Israel, Canada, Argentina, Great Britain, France, Germany, Poland, Yugoslavia, and South Africa. There is an analysis of the human rights implications of the Belgrade Conference. New estimates for the world Jewish population are given. Carefully compiled directories of national Jewish organizations, periodicals, and federations and welfare funds, as well as religious calendars and obituary notices, round out the 1979 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK. We are very grateful to our colleague Joan Margules for technical and editorial assistance. Thanks are also due to Amy Carr for preparation of the index, and to the entire Information and Research staff. THE EDITORS Contributors BERNARD BASKIN; rabbi, Temple Anshe Sholom, Hamilton, Ont., Canada. ALVIN CHENKIN; research consultant, Council of Jewish Federations and Wel- fare Funds. DENIS DIAMOND; executive director, South African Jewish Board of Deputies, Johannesburg. MILTON ELLERIN; director, trends analysis division, American Jewish Commit- tee. GEORGE E. GRUEN; director, Israel and Middle East affairs, foreign affairs department, American Jewish Committee; adjunct associate professor of Judaic studies, Brooklyn College, CUNY. LIONEL E. KOCH AN; Bearsted Reader in Jewish history, University of Warwick; honorary fellow, Oxford Centre for Post-graduate Hebrew Studies, England. MIRIAM KOCHAN; journalist; translator, Oxford, England. CHARLES S. LIEBMAN; Mendelsohn Visiting Professor of Jewish Sociology, Jewish Theological Seminary of America; on leave from Bar Ilan University. SIDNEY LISKOFSKY; director, division of international organizations, foreign affairs department, American Jewish Committee. MISHA LOUVISH; writer; translator; journalist, Jerusalem. ARNOLD MANDEL; essayist; novelist; reporter and literary critic, Information Juive and L'Arche; contributor, literary supplement, Le Monde, Paris. NAOMI F. MEYER; co-director, Camp Ramah, Argentina. MAYNARD MIRAN; research associate, Council of Jewish Federations and Wel- fare Funds. GERALDINE ROSENFIELD; researcher, American Jewish Committee. FRIEDO SACHSER; political and news editor, Allgemeine Judische Wochezeitung; German correspondent, London Jewish Chronicle, Diisseldorf. LEON SHAPIRO; professor of Russian and Soviet Jewish history, member of faculty on the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, Rutgers University. vii Table of Contents PREFACE v CONTRIBUTORS vii SPECIAL ARTICLES Leadership and Decision-making in a Jewish Federation: The New York Federation of Jewish Philanthropies Charles S. Liebman 3 Soviet Jewry Since the Death of Stalin: A Twenty-five Year Perspective Leon Shapiro 77 UNITED STATES CIVIC AND POLITICAL Intergroup Relations Milton Ellerin 107 The United States, Israel, and the Middle East George E. Gruen 120 The Belgrade Conference Sidney Liskofsky 152 COMMUNAL The American Jewish Community Responds to Issues of the Day: A Compendium Geraldine Rosenfield 160 IX X / CONTENTS DEMOGRAPHIC Jewish Population in the United States, 1978 Alvin Chenkin and Maynard Miran 111 OTHER COUNTRIES CANADA Bernard Baskin 190 LATIN AMERICA Argentina Naomi F. Meyer 205 WESTERN EUROPE Great Britain Lionel and Miriam Kochan 216 France Arnold Mandel 229 CENTRAL EUROPE Federal Republic of Germany Friedo Sachser 235 German Democratic Republic Friedo Sachser 253 EASTERN EUROPE Poland Leon Shapiro 255 Yugoslavia Leon Shapiro 258 ISRAEL Misha Louvish 260 SOUTH AFRICA Denis Diamond 283 WORLD JEWISH POPULATION Leon Shapiro 291 DIRECTORIES, LISTS AND NECROLOGY NATIONAL JEWISH ORGANIZATIONS United States 301 Canada 340 CONTENTS / Xi JEWISH FEDERATIONS, WELFARE FUNDS, COMMUNITY COUNCILS 343 JEWISH PERIODICALS United States 357 Canada 365 NECROLOGY: UNITED STATES 366 SUMMARY JEWISH CALENDAR, 5739-5743 (Oct. 1978-Sept. 1983) 378 CONDENSED MONTHLY CALENDAR, 1978-1980 (5738-5741) 380 REPORT OF JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA 406 SPECIAL ARTICLES IN VOLUMES 51-78 OF THE AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK 415 INDEX 418 Special Articles Leadership and Decision-making in a Jewish Federation: The New York Federation of Jewish Philanthropies by CHARLES S. LIEBMAN INTRODUCTION • STRUCTURE AND FUNCTIONS • POLICY AND INFLUENCE • LEADERSHIP • THE FUTURE INTRODUCTION A HE NEW YORK FEDERATION OF JEWISH PHILANTHROPIES (hereafter referred to as Federation) was organized in 1917, following al- most two years of discussion and negotiation.1 New York thus became the 23rd Jewish community in the United States to establish a central fund- collecting society for local agencies serving Jewish health and welfare needs. Today, there are approximately 220 Jewish federations throughout the Note: A large number of people helped make this study possible. My greatest debt of gratitude is to the New York Federation of Jewish Philanthropies; Federation's files, minutes, and meetings were all opened to me; every person to whom I turned for assistance was most cooperative. Three individuals who read and commented in detail on a first draft of this study merit particular mention: Sanford Solender, Federation executive vice-president; Dr. Donald Feldstein, Federation executive director for community services; and Mrs. Laurence (Billie) Tisch, immediate past chairman of Federation's Distribution Committee. None of them is in agreement with all of my conclusions, but this makes me all the more grateful to them for their help. 'There is no scholarly history of Federation. The most comprehensive survey is The Golden Heritage: A History of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of New York from 1917 to 1967 (New York, 1969). This is surprisingly informative, considering it was published by Federation in honor of its own 50th anniversary. But it was not intended as a systematic, much less scholarly, history. On the early history of Federation see Deborah Dash Moore, "From Kehillah to Federation: The Communal Functions of Federated Philanthropy in New York City" (paper read at the annual conference of the Association of Jewish Studies, Boston, December 1976), and the bibliography cited therein, including Arthur A. Goren, New York Jews and the Quest for Community: The Kehillah Experiment, 1908-1922 (New York, 1970), and I. Edwin Goldwasser, "Federation for the Support of Jewish Philanthropies in New York City," AJYB, Vol. 20, 1918-1919, pp. 113-146. See also Deborah Dash Moore, "The Emer- gence of Ethnicity: New York's Jews 1920-1940" (Columbia University, unpublished doctoral dissertation, 1975). 4 / AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK, 1979 United States and Canada. About 200, including all but the smallest, are affiliated with the Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds (CJFWF).2 Over the course of time, the

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